Curiosity gripped him, though. He wouldn’t be able to get back to sleep. He got ready and, keys in pocket, left the room. In the lobby, an officer, the one from earlier, was stationed there. Langham walked outside. The fresh air slapped him hard, and if any remnants of sleep had had a mind to hang about, they fucked off then. He stood there, chilled, shivering, and thrust his hands into his trousers pockets. Made for The Running Hare.
The sign swung in the breeze, one that had picked up in its intensity since the last time he’d been out here. Something about that sign still bothered him and, once he got to the car park, he kept away from it, convinced it would lift itself off its hanger and throw itself at him. As he approached the main door, Fairbrother was on his way out, a bit green around the gills, despite being a seasoned officer.
“What the fuck are you doing here?” Fairbrother sniffed in a huge lungful of air.
“Couldn’t sleep.” Langham shrugged. “You know how it is.”
“Yep, but I reckon you’d be better off going back to where you came from, mate. This shit’s got a damn sight worse since I spoke to you last.”
Langham frowned. “Why? Playing you up, is she?”
“Nope, we’re searching for her now. She may well have done a runner, considering the mess in there.”
Langham was going to go inside without an invite. He had to see the mess for himself. “I’ll go and have a look, shall I?”
“If you have to, but you’ll probably regret it. I’ve come out here for a breath of fresh air. It’s just inside there, and not only that, shit’s going on out the back.”
Langham frowned again. Grabbed some protectives and suited up. Went inside. Was assaulted by the grim sight of a man who had once sipped Guinness in his ratty chair—a man whose head had been caved in, and the only reason Langham knew it was the old man was because he recognised his clothes.
Someone had given him quite a battering, and Langham found it difficult to imagine the old woman doing this. Then again, she’d had a bit of a mad glint in her eyes earlier, when they’d come back here to collect their things. And she wasn’t a spindly little thing, incapable of hurting someone. But to inflict this kind of damage? That was a lot of rage. The dead man may as well have had no head. It had been walloped so many times the skull had split, then bits of it had broken away. Knowing the strength of skull bone and how much force was needed to cave a head in, Langham realised she’d been beyond angry—at the seeing red stage. Hurt had to have been behind this attack, perhaps years of upset and suffering coming to the fore, giving her the strength to render this man facially unrecognisable. And fear. If she had thought she was going to get caught for killing the lady over the road…
“Jesus fucking wept.” He covered his mouth with his wrist.
Blood spatter had sprayed quite a distance, the majority of it dried, or drying farthest away from the victim, but the area immediately surrounding him was still tacky. Thick in places. The man’s clothing was soaked with it. The old woman had to have been covered, and if she hadn’t washed before she’d left, someone would have spotted her, given the state she’d have been in.
Where is she?
“You searched this place?” he asked a young officer standing near the bottom of the stairs.
“Yes, sir.”
“Right.” He walked out the back, alarmed that forensic tents had been erected while he’d slept.
What the hell?
Fairbrother joined him. “Grim business, eh? We noticed the earth had been disturbed out here, and one of the new lads had a bit of a look and found a bone sticking up out of the ground.”
“A bone?”
“Yep. Seems the old girl—or that fella in there—likes killing people. Quite a few bones have been found so far—more than one person, definitely a man and a woman. There might be others. You know, buried deeper.”
“I knew something was off about her, but bloody hell!”
“We’ve searched this place once, but I’ve sent men upstairs again. Loads of nooks and crannies in a gaff like this. I’d say she’s long gone, but you never know, do you.”
“No.” Langham took a few seconds to process things. Who the hell was buried out here? And why had they even been killed? Shit, he was glad this wasn’t his case. There were too many loose ends that needed tying up.
Back inside, he stood as far away from the victim as he could so he didn’t contaminate the scene. Stared around, trying to think of where she could have gone. The attic would have already been checked, as would the rooms, but…
A smudge of blood caught his attention, on the wall beside the stairs. Like a thumb print that had been dragged downwards. He walked towards it, examined farther up. Faint, bloody fingerprints, as if someone had needed to touch the wall for balance in order to even make it up the stairs.
“Fairbrother!” he shouted.
The thud of running feet on wooden flooring sounded, then Fairbrother was beside Langham.
“See those?” Langham asked.
“Fuck.”
Fairbrother took the lead, going up the stairs two by two. Langham followed, careful not to touch the walls. Fairbrother stared at those on the landing then went up another flight, one that was narrower and possibly led to the private
